PowerPedia:Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

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Johann Wolfgang Goethe, (gø?t?, later von Goethe, (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German There was an error working with the wiki: Code[46]: he was a poet, novelist, dramatist, humanist, scientist, There was an error working with the wiki: Code[47], painter, and for ten years chief minister of state for the duchy of Weimar.

Goethe was one of the key figures of German literature and the movement of Weimar Classicism in the late 18th and early 19th centuries this movement coincides with There was an error working with the wiki: Code[48], Sentimentality ("Empfindsamkeit"), Sturm und Drang, and Romanticism. The author of There was an error working with the wiki: Code[49] and Theory of Colours, he inspired Darwin with his independent discovery of the human intermaxillary jaw bones and focus on evolutionary ideas. Goethe's influence spread across Europe, and for the next century his works were a primary source of inspiration in music, drama, poetry, and philosophy. He is widely considered to be one of the most important thinkers in Western culture, and is often cited as one of History's greatest There was an error working with the wiki: Code[50]es.

Life

Early life (1749–1765)

Goethe's father, Johann Caspar Goethe (There was an error working with the wiki: Code[3], then part of the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[51]. Goethe's mother, Catharina Elisabeth Textor (There was an error working with the wiki: Code[52]–There was an error working with the wiki: Code[53]), the daughter of the Mayor of Frankfurt, married 38-year-old Johann Caspar when she was only 17. All their children, except for Goethe and his sister, Cornelia Friderike Christiana, who was born in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[54], died at an early age.

Johann Caspar and private teachers gave Goethe lessons in all common subjects, especially languages (There was an error working with the wiki: Code[4], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[5], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[6] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[7]). Goethe also took lessons in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[55], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[56] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[57]. He had a persistent dislike of the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[58], and characterized its history as a "hotchpotch of mistakes and violence" {Mischmasch von Irrtum und Gewalt). His great passion was There was an error working with the wiki: Code[59]. Goethe quickly became interested in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[60]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[61] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[62] were among his early favourites. He had a lively devotion to There was an error working with the wiki: Code[63] as well, and was greatly fascinated by There was an error working with the wiki: Code[64] shows that were annually arranged in his home –- a familiar theme in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[65].

Student life (1765-1775)

Leipzig (1765-1768)

Goethe studied There was an error working with the wiki: Code[8] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[9]. Already at this time, Goethe wrote very much – he threw away nearly all of these works, except for the comedy Die Mitschuldigen. The restaurant There was an error working with the wiki: Code[10]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[66] barrel ride impressed him so much that Auerbachs Keller became the only real place in his drama There was an error working with the wiki: Code[67]. Because his study did not advance, Goethe was forced to return to Frankfurt at the end of There was an error working with the wiki: Code[68]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[69].

Frankfurt/Strasbourg (1768-1770)

In Frankfurt, Goethe became severely ill. During the year and a half which followed, because of several relapses, the relationship with his father worsened. During convalescence, Goethe was nursed by his mother and sister. Bored in bed, he wrote an impudent crime comedy. In There was an error working with the wiki: Code[70]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[71], the father lost his patience Goethe left Frankfurt in order to finish his studies in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[72].

In There was an error working with the wiki: Code[73], Goethe blossomed. No other landscape has he described as affectionately as the warm, wide Rhine area. In Strasbourg, Goethe met There was an error working with the wiki: Code[74], who happened to be in town on the occasion of an eye operation. The two became close friends Herder was the first superior personality to become acquainted with Goethe. Crucial to Goethe's intellectual development, it was Herder who kindled his interest in Shakespeare, Ossian, and in the notion of Volkspoesie (folk poetry). On a trip to the village Sesenheim, Goethe fell in love with Friederike Brion. But after a couple of weeks, he ended the relationship. Several of his poems, like Willkommen und Abschied, Sesenheimer Lieder and Heideröslein, originate from this time.

Despite being based on own ideas, his legal There was an error working with the wiki: Code[75] was published uncensored. Shortly after, he was offered a career in the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[76]. Goethe rejected &ndash he did not want to commit himself, but to remain an "original genius".

Frankfurt and Darmstadt (1771)

At the end of There was an error working with the wiki: Code[11]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[77] from the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[78]. In a couple of weeks, the biography was converted into a colourful There was an error working with the wiki: Code[79]. The work, called "Götz von Berlichingen", went straight to the heart of his contemporaries.

Professional & Later Life (1772-1832)

In There was an error working with the wiki: Code[12] where he held a succession of political offices, even becoming the Duke's chief adviser.

He was There was an error working with the wiki: Code[13] in 1782. His journey to the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[14], assisting Duke There was an error working with the wiki: Code[15] of There was an error working with the wiki: Code[16], in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[80].

Works

The most important of Goethe's works produced before he went to Weimar was his tragedy There was an error working with the wiki: Code[17], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[81], and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[82].

To the period of his friendship with Schiller belong the continuation of Wilhelm Meister, the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[18], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[19] (From my Life: Poetry and Truth), his There was an error working with the wiki: Code[83], much scientific work, and a series of treatises on German art. His writings were immediately influential in literary and artistic circles.

In addition to his literary work, Goethe also contributed significant work to the sciences. In biology, his theory of plant metamorphosis stipulated that all plant formation stems from a modification of the leaf during his Italian journey (1786-1788), in July of 1787, he writes as the first indication of this idea:

There was an error working with the wiki: Code[1]

He is credited with the discovery of the intermaxillary bone in humans, during 1784 however, There was an error working with the wiki: Code[84] (1779) and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[85] (1780) had identified the same structure several years earlier.

Although it was never well received by scientists due to its apparent conflict with Newton's theory of light, against which Goethe fulminated, Goethe considered his There was an error working with the wiki: Code[86] to be his most important work. Although much of his position within this field is often blurred by misconceptions among both his detractors and eulogizers, based upon his experiments with prismatic colors Goethe characterized color as arising from the dynamic interplay of darkness and light, and standing between their polar qualities:

: ...they maintained that shade is a part of light. It sounds absurd when I express it but so it is: for they said that colours, which are shadow and the result of shade, are light itself, or, which amounts to the same thing, are the beams of light, broken now in one way, now in another''.

He also regarded light's physical nature, physiological effects (including the afterimages induced in the eye), and psychological effects as interrelated phenomena. In the twentieth century, Goethe's Theory of Colours influenced the philosopher There was an error working with the wiki: Code[87]'s There was an error working with the wiki: Code[88], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[89] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[90] have indicated the accuracy and suggestiveness of many of Goethe's scientific statements, and it has had a tremendous impact in other fields.

Key works

The following list of key works may give a sense of the scope of the impact his work had on his and modern times.

The short There was an error working with the wiki: Code[91], Die Leiden des jungen Werthers, or There was an error working with the wiki: Code[92], published in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[93], recounts an unhappy love affair that ends in suicide. Goethe admitted that he "shot his hero to save himself". The novel remains in print in dozens of languages and is frequently referred to in the context of a young hero, who becomes disillusioned with society and by his irreconcilable love for a young woman. The fact that it ended with the protagonist's suicide and funeral—a funeral which "no clergyman attended"—made the book deeply controversial upon its (anonymous) publication, for it seemed to condone suicide. One would have expected a clergyman to attend the funeral service and condemn an act considered to be sinful by Christian doctrine. Epistolary novels were common during this time, letter-writing being people's primary mode of communication. What set Goethe's book apart from other such novels was its expression of unbridled longing for a joy beyond possibility, its sense of defiant rebellion against authority, and, above all, its total subjectivity—qualities that pointed the way toward the Romantic movement.

The next work, his epic There was an error working with the wiki: Code[20], was to be completed in stages, and only published in its entirety after his death. The first part was published in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[21]. Faust became the ur-myth of many figures in the 19th century. Later, a facet of its plot, i.e., of selling one's soul to the devil for power over the physical world, took on increasing literary importance and became a view of the victory of technology and of industrialism, along with its dubious human expenses. On occasion, the play is still staged in Germany and other parts around the world.

Goethe's poetic work served as a model for an entire movement in German poetry termed Innerlichkeit ("introversion") and represented by, for example, There was an error working with the wiki: Code[22]. Goethe's words inspired a number of compositions by, among others, There was an error working with the wiki: Code[23], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[24], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[25], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[26]. Perhaps the single most influential piece is "Mignon's Song" which opens with one of the most famous lines in German poetry, an allusion to There was an error working with the wiki: Code[94]: "Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn?" ("Do you know the land where the lemons bloom?").

He is also widely quoted. Epigrams such as "Against criticism a man can neither protest nor defend himself he must act in spite of it, and then it will gradually yield to him", "Divide and rule, a sound motto unite and lead, a better one", and "Enjoy when you can, and endure when you must", are still in usage or are paraphrased. Lines from Faust, such as "Das also war des Pudels Kern", "Das ist der Weisheit letzter Schluss", or "Grau ist alle Theorie" have entered everyday German usage. Although a doubtful success of Goethe in this field, the famous line from the drama Götz von Berlichingen ("Er kann mich im Arsche lecken": "He can lick my arse") has become a vulgar idiom in many languages, and shows Goethe's deep cultural impact extending across social, national, and linguistic borders. It may be taken as another measure of Goethe's fame that other well-known quotations, such as There was an error working with the wiki: Code[95]' "Art is long, life is short", which is also found in his Wilhelm Meister, is usually forgotten to be originally associated with Hippocrates.

Eroticism

Many of Goethe's works depict homoerotic and generally erotic occurrences, such as in There was an error working with the wiki: Code[27], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[28] than he is typically thought to be.

Historical importance

It is very difficult to overstate the importance of Goethe on the There was an error working with the wiki: Code[96]. In many respects, he was the originator of—or at least the first to cogently express—many ideas which would later become familiar. Goethe produced volumes of poetry, essays, criticism, and scientific work, including a theory of There was an error working with the wiki: Code[97] and early work on There was an error working with the wiki: Code[98] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[99]. He was fascinated by There was an error working with the wiki: Code[100] and early There was an error working with the wiki: Code[101] (the mineral There was an error working with the wiki: Code[102] is named for him). His non-fiction writings, most of which are philosophic and aphoristic in nature, spurred on the development of many philosophers, such as There was an error working with the wiki: Code[103], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[104], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[105], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[106], There was an error working with the wiki: Code[107], and others, and of various literary movements, such as There was an error working with the wiki: Code[108]. He embodied many of the contending strands in art over the next century: his work could be lushly emotional, and rigorously formal, brief and epigrammatic, and epic. He would argue that There was an error working with the wiki: Code[109] was the means to controlling art, and that There was an error working with the wiki: Code[108] was a sickness, even as he penned poetry rich in memorable images, and rewrote the formal rules of German poetry.

His poetry was set to music by almost every major Austrian and German composer from There was an error working with the wiki: Code[29] to There was an error working with the wiki: Code[30], and his influence would spread to French drama and opera as well. Beethoven declared that a "Faust" Symphony would be the greatest thing for Art. Liszt and Mahler both created symphonies in whole or in large part inspired by this seminal work which would give the 19th century one of its most paradigmatic figures: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[111]. The Faust tragedy/drama, often called "Das There was an error working with the wiki: Code[112] der Deutschen" (the drama of Germans), written in two parts published decades apart, would stand as his most characteristic and famous artistic creation.

Goethe was also a cultural force, and by researching folk traditions, he created many of the norms for celebrating There was an error working with the wiki: Code[31] view that reason was sufficient to create well-ordered societies and good laws.

List of the major publications

The following is a list of the major publications of Johann Wolfgang von Goethe. Over 140 volumes comprise the entirety of his literary efforts, ranging from the poetical to the philosophical.

Dramas

1787: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[118] (Iphigenia in Tauris)

1788: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[32]

1790: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[119]

1808: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[33]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[34]

1832: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[35]There was an error working with the wiki: Code[36]

Poems

1771: Heidenröslein (Heath Rosebud)

1773: ''There was an error working with the wiki: Code[120]

1782: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[121] (The Alder King)

1790: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[122] (Roman Elegies)

1794: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[123]

1797: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[124] (The Sorcerer's Apprentice)

1798: Hermann und Dorothea

1813: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[125] (Found)

Nonfiction

1790: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[126] (The Metamorphosis of Plants), scientific text

1810: Zur Farbenlehre (There was an error working with the wiki: Code[127]), scientific text

1817: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[128] (Italian journey)

1832/33: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[129] (Posthumous Works)

1836: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[130] (There was an error working with the wiki: Code[131]) also translated as: Conversations with Eckermann.

Other works

1786: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[37]

1798: Die Weissagungen des Bakis (The Soothsayings of Bakis)

1798/01: There was an error working with the wiki: Code[132] (periodical)

Influence

Goethe's influence was dramatic because he understood that there was a transition in European sensibilities, an increasing focus on sense, the indescribable, and the emotional. This is not to say that he was emotionalistic or excessive on the contrary, he lauded personal restraint and felt that excess was a disease: "There is nothing worse than imagination without taste". He argued in his scientific works that a "formative impulse", which he said is operative in every organism, causes an organism to form itself according to its own distinct laws, and therefore rational laws or fiats could not be imposed at all from a higher, transcendent sphere this placed him in direct opposition to those who attempted to form "enlightened" monarchies based on "rational" laws by, for example, There was an error working with the wiki: Code[38] of Austria or, the subsequent Emperor of the French, There was an error working with the wiki: Code[39]. A quotation from his Scientific Studies will suffice:

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This change would later become the basis for 19th century thought—organic rather than geometrical, evolving rather than created, and based on sensibility and intuition, rather than on imposed order, culminating in, as he said, a "living quality" wherein the subject and object are dissolved together in a poise of inquiry. Consequently, he embraced neither There was an error working with the wiki: Code[40] views that contemporaneous science subsumed during his time, and therewith he denied rationality's superiority as the sole interpretation of reality. Furthermore, he declared that all knowledge is related to humanity through its functional value alone and that knowledge presupposes a There was an error working with the wiki: Code[41] quality. He also stated that the fundamental nature of the world is There was an error working with the wiki: Code[133].

His views make him, along with There was an error working with the wiki: Code[42] period of architecture on the other, seeking a personal, intuitive, and personalized form of expression and polity, firmly supporting the idea of self-regulating and organic systems. Thinkers such as There was an error working with the wiki: Code[43] and There was an error working with the wiki: Code[44] would approach within the scientific paradigm.